Stage lighting systems have increased in complexity in recent years. It is desirable to be able to change literally any aspect of the beam projected by a stage light from a remote location. Light & Sound Design, the assignee of the present application, have suggested in other patents and applications that many of these issues could be improved by a stage lighting system that uses an active, x, y addressable element with a digital micromirror device ("DMD") available from Texas Instruments. These devices use an array of controllable mirrors to selectively reflect light in pixel units. These devices have also been called digital mirror, digital light processor (DLP), and other names. Light can be selectively reflected in units of picture elements or pixels. This allows total control of light shape and certain other characteristics. Other devices which are controllable to selectively change characteristics of pixels of light, such as a grating light valve (GLV), can also be used for this purpose.
These concepts are disclosed in several pending patent applications of Light & Sound Design, including Ser. No. 08/854,353, the disclosures of which are herewith incorporated by reference to the extent necessary for proper understanding.
The pixel based light processors, however, themselves produces certain issues, including control issues and cooling issues. The present disclosure describes these and other issues which were found to exist, and describes certain solutions found by the inventors to combat these issues.